Total pages in book: 120
Estimated words: 121755 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 609(@200wpm)___ 487(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121755 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 609(@200wpm)___ 487(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
The other girls’ gasps came after mine.
And then I was about to lose it.
Entirely.
Because in the window was a big decal of a cute, illustrated girl with pink hair, blushing cheeks, happy crescents for eyes, wearing a chef’s hat with a pretty little green flower on it. She was holding a piping bag.
And under her in a pretty but fun font, it said, Willow’s Good Stuff.
It was my logo, enlarged, backwards from where I stood, but my logo.
In order not to collapse into sobs at witnessing that magnificence, I put my hands over my nose and mouth and pressed hard.
“I’m gonna take that as you approve,” Tex remarked.
I didn’t remove my hands from my face as I looked to him and nodded.
Someone was rubbing my back.
I finally pulled my hands away and said a throaty, “Thank you,” to Tex. I then turned to Tito and said, “Really, thank you so much.”
“You’re gonna make us buckets of bread, which means I’m gonna be able to buy my Nancy that wine fridge she wants. So don’t thank us,” Tex said.
Maybe.
Maybe my desserts on the menu and more treats in the case and their percentage of my business (and we hadn’t even negotiated that yet!) would make them a little more money.
But they were taking a chance on me. They were giving me my dream.
And lest we forget what just happened…
They’d bought me a big-ass decal and put it in the window.
So Tex could be as casual as he wanted because he wasn’t big on showing emotion.
But, worth a repeat, they were making my dream come true.
As such, it was safe to say, I was grateful.
I turned to Tito and hugged him.
He patted my back while he returned the hug.
“Really, thank you,” I whispered in his ear, wishing I had more words, ones that would share even a hint of what I was feeling.
“Should have done it a while ago.” He pulled slightly away. “But I’m glad we’re doing it now.”
I didn’t know what to say so I just sniffed.
I sensed he got me as he let me go and patted my shoulder.
I looked to Tex. “Can I hug you?”
“Fuck no,” he replied.
As suspected.
I gave my girls a happy smile and noted they were already smiling that way at me.
Then I took my phone out of my apron, went outside, snapped a few snaps and sent them first, to Gabe, then to Mom and Robbie.
My text was, I’m official.
Mom sent about fifty intermingled sobbing and smiley emojis. Robbie dropped a thumbs up on the picture.
And Gabe replied, Fucking awesome.
He was so right.
We all got back to work.
Later, after my shift was over, I was working in the kitchen with Lucia, all the cupcakes were done and boxed and awaiting delivery so I could assemble the towers at the site, and I was closing in on finishing decorating the cookies for the baby shower the next day…
That was when Mom sashayed into the kitchen.
“So this is where the magic happens,” she said.
Before I could reply, say, tell her she couldn’t just stroll into a restaurant’s kitchen even if her daughter worked there, both the owners were eccentric (to say the least) and on any given day (or Angel assignment), all sorts of people could be trooping through there (what could I say? I didn’t want anything to mess with Lucia’s and my equilibrium because I didn’t want anything to mess with the opportunity Tito and Tex were giving me), she spoke again.
Loudly.
“Ooo! Look at how cute those are!”
She was gazing animatedly at my cookies.
They were cute, little foxes and bears, squirrels and bunnies, deer and racoons.
But Lucia was in her zone, and I didn’t need my mom’s animation to disturb it.
I rounded the prep table, grabbed her hand and tugged her to the staff room.
Once there, I said, “Love you, Mom, but you can’t just walk into Lucia’s kitchen like that.”
She was puzzled. “Why not?”
“Because she’s an artist. You don’t interrupt an artist.”
“You’re an artist too.”
“Yeah, so you shouldn’t interrupt me either,” I told her. “I thought we were meeting for dinner after I make my delivery. Is something up?”
“Well, kind of, if me and Robbie, Mike and Shelby ditching on dinner is something that’s up.”
Now I was puzzled. “You’re ditching dinner?”
“They’re coming up with us to Prescott. We’re gonna show them around. It carves about an hour and a half off their drive home on Sunday and Mike is like Robbie. He can only do the big city for a little while. He’s antsy. I’m gonna meet Shelby in a little bit, and we’re going to do a quick troll through Fashion Square Mall, and then we’re all heading up.”
“Oh,” I said, trying to pinpoint how I felt about Mom and Robbie, Mike and Shelby careening down the road to being best buds.
Obviously, I liked it.